Introduction

There has been a growing consensus at the global level indicating the impacts of climate change on different aspects of life are majorly attributed to greenhouse gases emissions. One such growing aspect of concern has been the economic growth of nations. While variables like rising temperatures, melting ice caps have had long-standing concerns, the shift in other climatic variables like changing in the level of humidity, regular flooding, changing patterns of precipitation have been having a significantly profound impact on the business activities as well.

Changes in patterns of wind speed, patterns of precipitation, and flooding on coastal regions of docks has been affecting both primary and tertiary sectors and thus and overall economic growth. For a long span of time, the rise in greenhouse gas emissions has been directly related to industrial growth and development. As the industries would expand, production would rise and subsequently lead to more emission of greenhouse gases as well. The United Kingdom took the initiative of fighting by the strategy of decoupling. The aspects of industrial development, the subsequent rise in GHG emissions, the economic impact of GHG emissions, and finally UK’s strategy of decoupling have been discussed in this study.

Economic Aspect Of Climate Change

There has been a growing concern for the emission of greenhouse gases prevalent for decades. The scientific evidences find that if there is a constant rise in the greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide or CO2, now these emissions would have a significant economic impact of climate change

However, the rise in greenhouse emission is also directly related to the rate of growth of an economy. An economy which is more inclined to industrialization, the emission of greenhouse gases tends to increase with rising demand, increasing industrial activities and subsequently leading to a higher level of production. But it is just the side of rise in level of production that presents a positive picture on the result from greenhouse gasses emission. More than these emissions reflect the economic growth, there is rising concern on the adverse impact on the economic activities that greenhouses gases emissions project to have.

The studies from different nations carry out different studies depending upon the climatic factors that have been impacting their economy. However, developed nations like the United Kingdom, USA, Brazil, Australia, etc have been able to develop sophisticated approaches to address the economic factors while ensuring the decrease in emission of greenhouse gases. The developing nations on the other hand tend to be more vulnerable to effects of the greenhouse warming. These nations do not have access to the technologies that result in lower carbon emission, thus, the road to development for these nations leads to further emission in greenhouse gases affect economic growth, and further share in dealing with greenhouse warming.

On the part of the United Kingdom, the nation has already dealt with severe consequences of greenhouse warming and has been subsequently deploying approaches of decoupling to reduce the impact of greenhouse emissions and climate change on its economic growth. These aspects have subsequently been discussed later in this paper.

Economic Approaches To Greenhouse Emission And Global Warming

Six major greenhouse gases have been identified as the contributor of the greenhouse effect, these include carbon dioxide (CO2); nitrous oxide (N2O), perfluorocarbons (PFC), methane (CH4), hydrofluorocarbons (HFC), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6). The emission of these gases combined tends to endanger the health and welfare of the public, their ability to contribute to economic growth, and the adverse impact on future generations as well (EPA, 2021).

Figure: Tradeoff Between The Consumption Goods And Non-Renewable Sources Of Energy
Source: (Pettinger, 2021)

The production possibility curve showed above reflects the tradeoff between the consumption level of goods and subsequent non-renewable sources of energy that are deployed at the production level of these goods. For example, if the tremendous economic growth in the previous century has led to steep decline of energy resources and subsequently resulted in significantly high level of emissions into the environment leading to significant development in the spectrum of economic growth as well. There has been a decline in non-renewable sources of energy like coal, gas, etc. but furthermore, there has been a significant change in environmental affects and waste management.

The climatic changes further impact the economic activities that are directly related to agriculture, fish stocks, food supply, and the businesses that are dependent on these are raw material. Thus, this tends to have a directly adverse impact on the subsequent economic growth as well (Pettinger, 2021).

The Limits theory in this aspect suggests that more the level of economic growth is, there are higher chances of environmental damage, and further this damage would act as a break in the aspects of economic growth as the economic forces would first have to deal with the impact of these climate change aspects on the business. There is another school of thought that infers to the fact that the level of toxins that have been spewed into the ecology due to inconsiderate growth has further led to pressing problems (Pettinger, 2021).

UK’s History Of Greenhouse Gases Emissions, Climate Change And Risks To Industries

By the period of 1850, the United Kingdom was one of the top most emitters of carbon dioxide in the world (carbon dioxide tends to be one of the major contributors in terms of greenhouse gasses emissions).  This was the time of significant industrial growth of the United Kingdom and industries require all sorts of exhaustible resources to be deployed for constant production and exports (Friedrich & Damassa, 2014).

Subsequently, this started to show adverse impact on the economic growth of the UK resulting in polluted water bodies, affecting the cycle of air pollution, dense smog, leading the nation to pass the clean air act as well as climate change act to address these seeping issues from affecting the health of the population and having an adverse impact on the economic growth as well. Economic growth is directly related to the ways industries and businesses in the nation operate. The empirical evidences reflect that particularly in the United Kingdom, greenhouse emissions have resulted in erratic climate changes which have started posing severe risks to several industries. Rise in the phenomenon of flooding as well as extreme weather events not only impact on the agricultural and fishery industries but also tend to have a profound impact on the allied industries like shipping, telecom as well as transportation sectors which show severe hit due to incidents resulting from climate change (CCC UK, 2017). To know more take assistance from Coursework help experts of SourceEssay.

Many parts of UK have become severely prone to flooding in recent years which have directly corresponded to the risks to which the businesses are exposed to, due to rising exposure of business sites to these disasters. While some areas are low risk regions and easily manageable in terms of handling the consequences of the flood, for other areas, the risks and exposures can be significantly greater, having a damaging and lasting impact on the industries. United Kingdom is also an island nation, so due to constant flooding, coastal erosion is one such significant economic loss as numerous industries rely on these for robust international trade.

The United Kingdom has a global supply chain from its coastal regions which extend to global markets. The weather related disruptions of climate change pose a greater risk to hamper these areas of trade subsequently having a profound impact on several other industries in the nation (Climate Change Committee, 2017).

Greenhouse Gases Emissions And UK

The economic growth in the United Kingdom represents the evidence of absolute decoupling in the span between 1985 and 2016, in the period where the gross domestic product has seemed to grow by around 70 percent per head, while the CO2 emissions have subsequently fallen by around 34 percent at the same time. This result can largely be attributed to the major economic structural changes, strict enforcement of environmental regulations like the clean air act, climate change act, etc. 

The emission in UK can be understood by the factor that the just-in lockdown occurring due to the pandemic, the carbon dioxide emission in the nation has fallen by around 10 percent in comparison to the year 2019 (Department for Business, 2021). Since the rise greenhouse gases emission was at large since the industrial revolution, the rising greenhouse warning also raises the demand for space cooling devices, which has a further impact on the rise of emission levels (Office for Nationa statistics, 2021).

Environmental Impact Of UK’s Economic Growth

A lot of goods and services have a tendency to escape the national income evaluations, leading to a direct impact on the calculation of growth. As per my assignment help experts Areas like human health, capacity to work, physical and mental fitness, which are directly related to the level of production and growth in the economy, but are also likely to be severely impacted by the environmental factors and greenhouse gases (Nordhaus, 2020).

Over the past few years, in order to decrease the adverse impact of climate change over economic development, the UK has been tremendously investing in the framework of decoupling. The term decoupling in this sense advocates the idea of dissociation of economic growth to greenhouse gas emissions. In the past the emission rate have reflected the pace of industrial development, but the same emissions have led to tremendously adverse impact on the economic growth of primary and tertiary sectors, and hence laying an adverse impact on the national economic growth on the whole.

In consideration to the consumption of non-renewable sources of energy, in the decades of economic growth in the United Kingdom has parallel been contributed to the higher level of pollution, potential loss of environmental habitat as well as global warming. Consequently, these elements like air pollution and global warming in turn have been having an adverse impact on the way. All these have been achieved because the constant climate change and greenhouse gas emission issues have led the government to invest in ways that are more reliable to renewable energy (EPA, 2021). You can ask electricity emission rate report from SourceEssay write my assignment experts team.

There are cross-cutting factors that impact the economic growth of the United Kingdom owing to climate change in the aspects of greenhouse emissions. The interaction of these risks is majorly the most concerning issue. For example, greenhouse gas emissions directly leads to warming and further melting of ice covers; this subsequently results in the rising in the coastal water levels. While not only these affect the primary industries like agricultural or fishing, they also impact tertiary industries like transportation which is heavily reliable on the coastal infrastructure. Even though there has been little assessment of the actual economic impact that there has been owing to greenhouse gas emission, it cannot be denied that the magnitude of direct loss of economic growth owing to these factors has not been significant (World Economic Forum, 2021).

Cross Cutting Economic Issues Of Climate Change In UK

Source: (CCC UK, 2017)

Particularly from the spectrum of economic growth, greenhouse emission and climate change impact different people in a different manner, depending on their economic status. In the aspects of lower-income households, they tend to be highly susceptible to the impacts of climate change at large (reflected in the above figure). Essay help identified climate change can severely impact their need for resources to survive in heated climates, the disposable income of these consumers tends to have a significant impact. As the low-income consumers are already low on resources, they further have lower capacity to adapt to market changes as well.

The other issues that are related in this aspect include that addressing the issues of climate change at local and public levels also require knowledge, access to resources, availability of data as well as skills to deal with the adverse impact.

Decoupling Strategy Of UK And Its Economic Impacts

The term decoupling in this sense advocates the idea of dissociation of economic growth to greenhouse gas emissions. In the past the emission rate have reflected the pace of industrial development, but the same emissions (as discussed above) have led to tremendously adverse impact on the economic growth of primary and tertiary sectors, and hence laying an adverse impact on the national economic growth on the whole. It was back in 1985 when the UK laid its decoupling strategy on roll. The nation started investing into newer and greener technologies which would allow the significantly similar level of growth but with lower levels of emission. Thus, the businesses and nations in the economy are required to comply by acts like Climate Change Act 2008, which commits that the technologies used in the growth and development are not leading to greenhouse emissions.

The rationale behind this process is simply to break the direct relationship that has prevailed between economic growth and greenhouse gases emissions. The United Kingdom has significantly been able to achieve its targeted growth under the decoupling process as the economic structural changes have contributed in the overall economic growth while reducing the national level of emissions of greenhouse gases. However, the region is not devoid of the consequences of global warming that has been a result of greenhouse gases emission at global level. The data from 1985 to 2016 presents that the UK has somewhat been able to achieve that target, however, its economy still remains being affected by global GHG emissions, melting ice caps, and rising threats of coastal flooding which form a significant part of UK’s economic sectors (Office for Nationa statistics, 2021). In case you have doubt, get immediate assistance from do my essay for me experts of SourceEssay.

Conclusion

In the above discussion it can be clearly established that since 1850 and subsequent industrial revolution, with rise in industrial expansion, the economy of UK has led to significant emission of greenhouse gases that has further contributed in the various set of climate changes which have been severely impacting the economic growth and businesses of the nation as well.

Many parts of UK have become severely prone to flooding in the recent years which have directly corresponds to the risks to which the businesses are exposed to, due to rising exposure of business sites to these disasters. While some areas are low risk regions and easily manageable in terms of handling the consequences of the flood, for other areas, the risks and exposures can be significantly greater, having a damaging and lasting impact on the industries. United Kingdom is also an island nation, so due to constant flooding, coastal erosion is one such significant economic loss as numerous industries rely on these for robust international trade.

As a result, the strategy of decoupling has been deployed in the nation to break the direct connection that has been prevalent in industrial expansion and the subsequent GHG emissions. The data from 1985 to 2016 presents that the UK has somewhat been able to achieve that target, however, its economy still remains being affected by global GHG emissions, melting ice caps, and rising threats of coastal flooding which form a significant part of UK’s economic sectors.

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